Devils acquire goaltender from Canadiens

The Devils are “gaining traction” on acquiring goaltender Jake Allen from the Canadiens, per Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet. The Canadiens will receive a third-round pick in return, Emily Kaplan of ESPN reports. The third-round pick is conditional and can upgrade to a second-rounder if Allen hits a certain games-played benchmark, per Frank Seravalli of Daily Faceoff. Per TSN’s Darren Dreger, it’s a 2025 third-rounder with 40 games played as the condition cutoff. Montreal is retaining 50% of Allen’s $3.85M cap hit that runs through next season, Chris Johnston of TSN and The Athletic says.

Allen was always the most logical option to ship out of Montreal if the Habs opted to move out one of their three NHL-rostered goaltenders. The 33-year-old has been the worst out of his trio with Sam Montembeault and Cayden Primeau this year in what’s been a second straight season significantly below average, averaging a .892 SV% in 62 starts and one relief appearance since 2022.

Signed to a two-year, $7.7M extension in October 2022 that kicked in this season, Allen regressed sharply before his new deal kicked in. He was decent in his first two seasons in Montreal, though, posting a .906 SV% and 20-32-9 record in 64 games between 2020 and 2022 while backing up Carey Price and platooning with Montembault after the former played through a career-ending knee injury in the Habs’ run to the 2021 Stanley Cup Final. With the younger Primeau surpassing Allen on the depth chart as of late, the veteran has only played four games since the beginning of February.

This year, Allen has made 21 starts, posting a 6-12-3 record. His .892 SV% and 3.65 GAA are both far below the league average. While his -2.8 goals saved above expected (MoneyPuck) is the worst on the team, it does demonstrate that his poor base-level stats are exacerbated by playing behind a rebuilding team. He immediately becomes the best-performing goalie on the Devils relative to expectations, who have had absolutely no sustainable success in the crease with Vítek Vaněček (-11.2 GSAx), Nico Daws (-4.5 GSAx), and Akira Schmid (-3.0 GSAx) all performing at a below-replacement level. Allen brings in Stanley Cup pedigree, having won with the St. Louis Blues in 2019, as well as over 400 games of NHL experience.